How AI could enable catastrophic pandemics

Abstract

Overview of how advances in AI and synthetic biology are lowering the technical barriers to creating pandemic-class pathogens. While frontier US language models have implemented safeguards against dual-use biological queries, the author notes that leading Chinese models exhibit significantly weaker protections, and that many high-risk AI-enabled biological design tools are open-source. The article calls for urgent implementation of mandatory DNA synthesis screening, hardened biosecurity evaluations of frontier models, and broader pandemic preparedness infrastructure. – AI-generated abstract.